Anomalous
"home" stadiums:
Shared, "hand-me-down," neutral...

In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy learned that "there's no place like home," but in the world of major league baseball, that concept has sometimes been problematic over the years. This page attempts to clarify some of the anomalous situations that have arisen when teams found it expedient to play some of their "home" games at other stadiums, and sometimes in other cities. Note that some major league ballparks, such as Hiram Bithorn Stadium, fit into more than one category.

Stadiums shared by two teams

Since 11 of the original 16 major league franchises were located in cities with more than one team during the first half of the 20th century, it is not surprising that two teams sometimes shared the same stadium. Of the eight cases listed below, the first four were the result of teams moving out of small, obsolete stadiums. Interestingly, the National League teams in both St. Louis and Philadelphia upstaged their American League "landlords" in terms of winning records and attendance, and the original home teams relocated to other cities during the 1950s. When the Dodgers and Angels shared Dodger Stadium, the Angels called it "Chavez Ravine" to conceal the fact that they were mere tenants there. (In the NFL, the New York Jets drape Giants Stadium with green colors when they play there, but have made no effort to change its name.) During the renovation of their stadium in 1974-1975, the Yankees became the only major league team ever to become "tenants" of another team for a second time.

It seems strange, but in the early years baseball teams were quite willing to leave behind their real home field in order to temporarily borrow a bigger cross-town venue during the all-important World Series. What is particularly weird is the fact that three of these four occasions were in Boston, where the Red Sox and Braves flip-flopped in using each others' brand new stadiums during three consecutive years. For you trivia buffs, there were three World Series in which all of the games were played in the very same stadium because both teams called the same place "home": In 1921 and 1922 (at the Polo Grounds), and in 1944 (at Sportsman's Park).

"Hand-me-down" stadiums

Five teams moved into stadiums that had been previously abandoned by other teams, and in four of those cases it was no more than a few years later. In the first such case, an established franchise team (the Cubs) took up residence in the brand new home of a short-lived team (the Whales) from the upstart Federal League, and they have been there ever since. In the next three cases, expansion franchises were awarded to cities as a "consolation" prize after the previous teams left town. In two of those cases the existing stadiums were already several decades old, and construction began on new stadiums almost immediately. In the fourth case, however, the existing County Stadium was not really that old, and in fact, construction on it had never even been completed. It was soon expanded in keeping with the original design, and the Brewers (who had been known as the Seattle Pilots for one season) stayed in it for three full decades. In the final case, the Washington Nationals (formerly known as the Montreal Expos) just took up temporary residence in RFK Stadium, which at 44 years was the second oldest stadium into which any relocated franchise ever moved. Memorial Coliseum was 45 years old when the Dodgers moved into it in 1958, but it had never before been used for major league baseball, and thus does not fit in this category.

Teams with two "home" stadiums

These strange cases had quite diverse origins, ranging all the way from reasonably expedient adaptation to circumstances on one hand, to crassly opportunistic ventures on the other. Likewise, the distance between the two "home" stadiums varied from a few miles to thousands of miles. In general, the shorter the distance, the longer the time during which this arrangement continued. In the case of the Expos, MLB officials wanted to find out whether local governments in Puerto Rico were enthusiastic enough to commit to supporting a major league team. It is also, apparently, a bargaining ploy to get officials in the Washington area or Portland to cough up more public money for a new stadium. In the case of Oakland, it was a real (though short-lived) emergency, as their stadium was still undergoing renovation at the beginning of the 1996 season.

"Neutral" stadiums: promotional and special contingency

In the early decades of professional baseball, teams were often forced to play in "neutral" venues -- i.e., ballparks that were not home to any major league team -- because of damage caused by fire or other extenuating circumstances. This table does not attempt to cover all those cases. As the 20th Century progressed, however, this practice of using "neutral" venues virtually ceased. Most of the stadiums listed below were used because MLB officials decided to hold legitimate, regulation games in them as part of an effort to promote international interest in the sport. There was supposed to be a pair of games between the Mariners and the Athletics in the Tokyo Dome at the beginning of the 2003 season, but security concerns related to the war in Iraq led MLB officials to reschedule those games back in the States.

NOTE: In addition, promotion-oriented exhibition games were held just prior to Opening Day in a variety of minor league ballparks across the South for many years, and in more recent years at such big-league-size facilities such as the Superdome in New Orleans and RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C. Playing host to such unofficial games does not qualify a stadium as a major league ballpark, however.